Temple’s 20th Anniversary Celebrations

10.10.2017 2 min read

The Directors and staff of Temple were delighted to host the 20th anniversary celebrations in the IET’s Maxwell library on Wednesday 27th September. Despite the rainy weather, we were delighted thrilled to welcome more than over 100 of our clients and partners to join our celebrations. Our guests arrived to the sound of Jazz (an obvious choice given Mark Southwood’s interests) and enjoyed the splendid views over the Thames as well as catching up with old friends and colleagues.

Roger Cooper, who was once a client (at Thameslink) and latterly a Temple Associate, shared his perspectives as both in a short speech midway into the festivities. Roger was very complimentary and talked of the special qualities of Temple, which helped set it apart from others in the market place. He talked of team loyalty and commitment, the “can do” attitude and the ability “to always go the extra mile”. He shared many fond memories of working with our founder and Chair Mark Southwood, and the wider team in recent years, before introducing Mark.

Mark in his turn reflected on some of the key changes in the environmental and planning arena over the last 20 years and some of the challenges, particularly in the UK infrastructure and development sectors.  He spoke with pride of the 200 or so people that had passed through Temple’s doors since its inception, and the fact that many of them had joined client and partner organisations both in the UK and internationally to lead and inspire good environmental practice and importantly remained a valued part of the Temple community. He identified some of the many and varied achievements over the years including over 800 projects and over 600 clients in Temple’s history, and a number of which can be viewed on our commemorative timeline.

Mark ended by stating that change was here to stay and the pace of this would only increase, referring to the current “disrupters” in the industry including technological advancement in all its guises and communication channels and the opportunity this affords our industry at this time and the need to adapt. He was enthusiastic about wider collaborations with technology houses as part of the future and was confident that the insights from the wider Temple community including partners, clients and alumni would prove invaluable in providing the right answers and making a meaningful contribution to addressing the many and varied challenges over the coming years.

Following the event we have received many thank-you and congratulatory messages from friends and clients alike which we always appreciate and is evidence of a good evening had by all.

We are already excited about the next 20 years!

Key Contacts

Mark Southwood Chair
Temple